My neighborhood for the next seven weeks....

I arrived in Vermont just after noon yesterday for a summer of mowing lawns, country hikes, swimming, Mountaineers Baseball (New England Collegiate Baseball League, Champions in 2006 and 2007) a week at the ocean and the wedding of a sister.  Except for the wedding, it's part of a ritual I've been practicing since my parents retired and moved back here in 1997.  I actually kind of like the humidity of the DC area, but it's certainly a lot easier to sleep when temps drop into the low-60s every night.

Anyway, we don't have 7-11s around here.  We have this place- Cumberland Farms, or just "Cumbys" to the locals.  Cumbys has pretty much everything you can find at a 7-11, including cheap iced coffee.  Like 99 cents for any size iced coffee.  It's actually pretty good- certainly worth 99 cents.

But this commercial is still pretty stupid- not for the reason the poster suggests- I don't think it's especially "sexist," because I don't think it makes men look especially stupid.  Like the guy at the end says, "you would have done this for any of us."  It's not the Big Stupid Guys falling all over themselves to save the Little Lady's iced coffee- it's that the iced coffee is so awesome that it would be a tragedy if it were to spill.  But that's what make it stupid- the iced coffee is 99 cents. If it fell on the ground, she shrugs her shoulders and goes back in and gets another one (in fact, if the store is in Vermont, chances are the person in the counter tells her "oh, that's too bad- just pour yourself another one, don't worry about paying again, honey."  Because people are kind of like that here.)

I mean, it's not like this woman is walking out of Starbucks with a $7 Venti Frappacino.  I can totally see people diving to save that from hitting the pavement.  That's not an impulse buy- that's an investment.

Listerine demonstrates a trend which really needs to stop now

The trend being "commercials disguised as serials."  We all know the drill- since people tend to zone out during ads which all basically look the same, more and more companies are trying to con us into paying attention by pretending that they are showing us a trailer for a wacky comedy or drama, nailing us with the "haha this is just a commercial, sucker" at the very end.  It works really well- if you are intensely stupid, as 99 percent of YouTube viewers seem to be.

For anyone with even a modicum of intelligence, that these are advertisements becomes obvious within three or four seconds.  But we aren't the intended audience, clearly.

Instead, the people these are aimed at are incredibly easily-deceived, slack-jawed morons who will not only be taken in by the "storyline," but will also fail to be insulted by the deception and will think it's cool that a company went to the "trouble" to produce something so "witty."  Believe it or not, there are plenty of them.  Check out the comments.

Personally, I blame that Taster's Choice series of commercials back in the 1980s featuring a budding romance between a woman and her next door neighbor who dropped in for coffee one day, was treated to horrible instant junk, and yet was so enamored that he kept coming back for more.  Or maybe she was the one who dropped in- I don't remember.  But it was the first set of commercials with a storyline that I remember, so I'll blame them for our current situation.

Meanwhile, I don't care about this ugly woman or her ugly, stupid family or why she thinks she needs to make sure they have clean breath (they all look perfectly old enough- I won't use the term "capable," because check out their behavior, ugh- to decide what to do about their oral hygiene, geesh is mom going to check their butts for bits of toilet paper like the cartoon bear in the Charmin commercials next?) I'm just going to let Listerine know that I don't appreciate the effort they put into this, at all, and I don't care what "happens next" with "The Franklins."  So please, stop this "series" and get back to just telling us how that stinging sensation proves your product is working, ok?  That was much better and probably didn't cost you nearly as much money anyway.

McDonalds, the...umm... "Realm of Happiness."

You know why McDonalds started putting "Playlands" in their "restaurants?" It's the same reason they've been putting toys in Happy Meals for the past several decades- to imprint on young minds the idea that McDonalds=Fun.  It's just another take on the concept of "Comfort Food"- when we become adults, we are more likely to associate McDonalds with happiness, without even really knowing why.  So when we are sad, moody, out-of-sorts, bitter, etc.-- in other words, Being Adults-- we will gravitate to the place that, for some reason we don't quite grasp, will make us reasonably ok with our lives, at least for a few minutes.

This commercial seems to be tossing the facade into the waste basket and blatantly exposing what is supposed to be this trade secret- yep, here it is, folks- McDonalds is sold to very little children as a magical land of fairies and fun and if you allow this place to be associated with All That Is Good And Comforting In The World, they'll grow up seeing it as a sanctuary from the Real World.  This poor little girl- who seems to have OD'd on something, BTW- sees nothing but joy in a trip to the Land of Greasy Junk that can be purchased with the change found under the car seat.  Mission Accomplished, McDonalds- here's another kid who is going to grow up eating your crap and not even knowing why, unless as an adult she sees this ad.  And by then it will be too late, of course.

There are two parts of this ad I'm not even going to deal with, because- just too weird even for me.  One is the Bluto character staring down at this little girl.  I don't know what that's all about, and I don't think I want to.  The other is the kid with the blue balloon- I don't know what he's doing, and I don't care.  I will say that if kids are doing these things at my local McDonalds (there are about thirty of them, actually) it's yet another good reason to stay away.

Oh, and the kid who whips the straw out of his drink because he's decided it's a sword (I guess)- well, whatever.  Kids will do stupid things like that, and make messes in the process, because parents aren't going to parent when they bring their kids to McDonalds.  If they were interested in parenting, they wouldn't bring their kids to McDonalds, after all....

Thank you, Listerine...

For at least sparing us the sight of this douchenozzle yacht owner actually spitting over the rail of his douchenozzle yacht.  That's something, at least.

As for the rest- I don't see how this is an advertisement tha is supposed to make me want to use Listerine, as it's being sold as a chemical so powerful that it will cause my mouth to explode and will actually rip the barnacles off my yacht, assuming I'm ever a one-percenter and can actually afford to own one.  I want to put this stuff in my mouth because......otherwise I might have slightly offensive breath?  Really?  So what's this guy's excuse- he's completely by himself here.  He's using an incredibly harsh chemical to impress his boat, or what?

And the summer hasn't even started yet....Nissan should pair with Advil.....

This ad is running FOUR TIMES between each inning during tonight's O's-Phillies game- back to back, then a break for another commercial not quite as obnoxious, then back to back again.  Seriously, we need to reconvene the Nuremburg judges, because this has got to be a war crime.

God I hate you, Nissan.  Are you really going to pound this moron hick's screeching into my brain until Labor Day?  Do you really hate me that much?

While most of the world is starving....

1.  We Americans are being told that our lives will simply not be complete until we gorge ourselves with a genuine "third-pounder sirloin burger" from the place everyone thinks of when they really want a good piece of sirloin, McDonalds.

2.  It's almost sad to think how many Americans are really going to buy the line that if they miss out on this limited opportunity to consume twice as much fat in one sitting than the average human eats in three days, they might never know what a good peice of sirloin tastes like.  Like McDonalds is actually selling high-grade cow on a bun here.  Let me assure you, people in the audience, that unless you think McDonalds is providing "good seafood" with it's Fish Filet And Mayonaisse sandwiches and "good poultry" with it's Chicken and Mayonaisse atrocities, you can skip right over this deal and not miss good sirloin.  Just trust me on this, ok?

Hyundai Asks "Remember When?"

As in, "Remember when you actually had to think for yourself instead of letting your car do your thinking for you?"

Or "Remember when becoming an adult meant accepting responsibilities and not being a child who couldn't be expected to do a lot on their own?"

Or "Remember when the simplest things in the world might be minor inconveniences, but they were things you put up with because after all, life is not perfect and you are capable of dealing with them?"

Remember all that?  It was yesterday.  Before Hyundai and every other car company on the planet decided that it's customers weren't pampered enough and were in the market for automobiles that treated them like oversized infants and did everything but wipe their buttoms and their noses for them.  I kind of miss those days.  Does anyone else?